Whew boy, is this going to be a long time to update! This trip is possibly the best trip Derek and I have taken since returning to the mainland two years ago (it'll be two years in September. Feels like longer than that, but no. Just two years. Another three here to go. That's a long time in Missouri, but that's army), and I was immediately depressed upon our return home. That depression hasn't really gone away, so it's building on top of my regular depression. In addition, we got the news on the 11th that Derek's dad has pancreatic cancer that has spread to his liver and lungs, he has a blood clot in his lung, things are not looking great. So that's weighing on me, too, though obviously not as much as it is weighing on Derek. But I will write about that later.
On to the show!!
Alright, so May 29th was the day we left for Ithaca. Derek and I had planned to leave at 6am, which meant getting the suitcases packed up, all of our gear in the car, and everything ready to go by about 10pm on the 28th so we could get a solid night of sleep before a ten hour day in the car. One of my primary focus points for the trip was making sure we didn't have to stop any more than necessary, so I wanted the car to be loaded with snacks and drinks and all manner of goodies for all of us. I may have gone a little...wild on the snack front:
Gotta have fruits so the kids can snack with health in mind! I must admit, that sad looking sack of brown garbage in the top photo....that is a failed batch of Black and White cookies. I was baking them to surprise my dad with, since we got black and white from Home Dairy a LOT when I was growing up. But I was in the middle of helping Alex pack her suitcase when the oven went off, Derek asked if he could get them out of the oven for me, and in the flustered state I was in, I said yes without telling him he needed to check for doneness. And they were not done baking yet. So they all fell and were VERY crumbly and not at all correct. There were a few that turned out alright, but I was so upset at the entire batch that I decided not to bother. So those sad cookies are currently freezing to death in my freezer, waiting for my youngest to gobble them all up.
We were making pretty decent progress. Derek and I got our shit packed up without incident, AND without going over the midnight mark. We've made a nasty habit of being the kind of people who pack last minute, well into the early morning hours, even though we are early morning travelers. When we went to Maui, we packed until 2am. We had a flight that left at 5am. What a disaster. Big Island? Same kind of deal. Trip to NC? SAME. We are the worst. But I had been so horned up for this trip that I wasn't fucking around at all. So Derek packed the camera gear, and I went to the store to try and find a car bag to put all of our snacks in. I didn't find one, even though I swear such things exist. I opted instead for a massive laundry bag, and then I tied it up with zipties to make it less absurdly deep. Behold! The snack cavern:
The cooler was chock full of drinks, fruits, and sammies for all of us. The bag was full of crackers and dried fruit and chips and a couple of sweet treats, nothing fancy. But DEFINITELY enough to sustain us for the two days on the road. Derek had his doubts that the cooler would fit comfortable between the kids in the car, but I was insistent, and I was, most importantly, correct.
We got the car packed up, and everything was ready to go. Ready for the 10 hour drive to Cleveland!
For some reason, Alex had her mask on, so we had to take the photo twice. You may be noticing how bright out it looks in the photos. How very not 6am it looks in the photos. That's because we left at 9am. NINE. Three hours later than intended. Which always fucking happens, these jabronies can't stick to a schedule! And by these jabronies, I mean me and Derek. We had wanted to leave early so we could get into Cleveland with enough time to see the spotlights of the city. My girlfriend Kati used to live there, and she gave us a few ideas of places we could go eat.
UNFORTUNATELY.
Due to our late leave time and the ridiculousness of the holiday weekend, which we hadn't even been tracking, fucking everything was closed by the time we arrived. Everything except Buffalo Wild Wings. So that's what Derek got for himself and the kids. I don't even remember what I ate, so it must have been good.
I do want to take a moment to mention that we were visitors on stolen land. While my best research found that the first nations people colonizers have on record in the Cleveland area are the Erie people, this does not mean they were the only. Kickapoo, Shawnee, and Ohio Valley people were also living here. All of the records and historical tellings of their histories have been written by white archeologists, and I'm not quite sure they are the best people to be telling the history of anybody but themselves. I did find it interesting to read that the Erie were all but wiped out in a war between themselves and the Iroquois Nation, leaving nothing behind, but I also read something that said the idea of "no trace of indigenous people in Ohio" is a lie told to make colonizers look like their Ohio land grab was not only justified, but anything other than colonization, as there were no people there to colonize. Which I don't have any trouble believing. I definitely need to educate myself on this matter further, I just need to find a source that's not going to white-wash the past.
Our hotel was...fine? It was a Sonesta Suites, which, you know, isn't swanky or upscale or anything. We're not the Rockefellers, obvy. We do save up all year for our trip, though, specifically so we can stay in nicer digs than...well, you'll see. Derek and I went back and forth a LOT about accommodations for this trip. The AirBnB we stayed at in Ithaca was a dream, and it was always going to be really nice. There were 6 of us staying there, and my dad and I split the cost, so those digs were pretty great. But for the places Derek and I would be 100% footing the bill for, there were debates. When I was a kid, we were poor and any time we traveled it was either crashing with family (which I HATED, because it meant no privacy), or it was crashing in uncomfortable motels where I had to share a bed with my step sister and share the entire room with my mom and step dad. And I ALSO hated that. I told Derek that the entire purpose of us saving so much for these trips is to have the best experience and give our kids the best experience, so that should mean, at the very LEAST, both kids having their own bed, if not finding AirBnBs and getting each kid their own room. Space is important! We've been cramped in a car together all day, everybody should get their own area to detox in. Derek does not share that opinion. He thinks, because his vacations were like mine as a kid, that the kids need the same kind of vacation. Like it builds character or some shit. I think it builds resentment, but what do I know. I won the day on the way up, though. Our Cleveland hotel had a loft for Derek and I, and a separate room with a separate bathroom for the kids. They got their own beds and space, Derek and I had our own bed and space, it was great. I didn't get the greatest photos of it, but I did catch a few:
The living room, complete with fireplace and "art".
Those stairs lead up to the loft area, where Derek and I holed up. The bedroom downstairs, which I didn't take a photo of for whatever reason, was where the kiddos stayed. THEY had a door. We did not.
The kitchen area, which was pretty alright, except for the whole dirty silverware thing. OH! I brought leftovers for myself that I had cooked up two nights before we left! Cabbage, carrot, onion, and vegan chicken with my homemade chili sauce. So I was right! My dinner WAS delicious!
A very blurry photo of the loft where Derek and I slept, though I took it as an after thought on our way out the next morning.
So after Derek went and grabbed B-Dubs for himself and the kids, I read to everyone.
I've been really excited to read this book, and I thought it would make perfect material for after dinner reading. I read three stories, for about an hour, while everyone finished eating. And it may seem silly, or strange, but it REALLY mattered to me that I get to read to everyone. When Rhyann was little, I read to her every night that I was able. I read to her when I was pregnant with her. Reading has always been a huge part of my life, but I had to leave her when she was so little that she does not have any memory of how much I read to her, and how important reading has always been to me. Alex, on the other hand, has bajillions of memories off me reading to her, because I've done it her whole life. When she was about 8, I read The Chronicles of Narnia to her and Sidney, and she stopped me mid-read during The Magician's Nephew and asked me, "are you a wizard, mama? How do you make your voice do all the different voices??" And I remember feeling so loved and thrilled. I've done that for Alex her whole life. I am a theatrical reader. I do all the voices differently, I act everything out with inflection, I get REALLY into it. This hasn't changed as Alex got older. The most recent things I read and acted out for her and Derek were Good Omens, followed by His Dark Materials. Right now, we're in the middle of So You Want To Talk About Race, and that doesn't require vocal gymnastics, but the point I'm making is Alex has 15 years of memories of me reading to her that Rhyann just...doesn't have. So I wanted to read to my oldest and create a memory of it. Self-serving, for sure, and who even knows if it'll become a core memory for her. It's more likely to become a snippet of the trip that fades away, because it was such an amazing trip. But for me, it's tucked away with the other memories I hold closest to my silly little heart.
And then we all went to bed. We had to be up and on the road by 7am the next morning, because the 30th is when the trip really popped off.
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